Guest Profiles

Activists, former bureaucrats, political analysts and organizations working towards strengthening people's participation in governance were invited to share their views. Learn a little more about our guests.

Yamini Aiyar is a Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for Policy Research and the Director of Accountability Initiative. She has extensive experience working on issues related to strengthening public service delivery systems and institutionalizing accountability mechanisms through greater citizen participation. She holds an MSc in Development Studies from the London School of Economics. Website: http://www.accountabilityindia.in | Email:

Subrat Das is the Executive Director of Centre for Budget and Governance Accountability. He has worked on India's public policy on natural disasters; public spending on social sectors; responsiveness of budgets to disadvantaged sections of the population; and bottlenecks in budgetary processes in the country. He has studied Economics at the Centre for Economic Studies and Planning, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. Website: http://www.cbgaindia.org | Email:

Justice (Retd.) Santosh Hegde is a former justice of the Supreme Court of India, former Solicitor General of India and was Lokayukta (anti-corruption ombudsman) in the state of Karnataka from 2006–2011.

Shankar Singh is one of the founder members of Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan. He has combined over two decades of activism with the power of people's communication—especially street theatre, puppetry and song—to strengthen the voice of the poor. Through his uncanny, incisive wit and his keen political insight, he instinctively communicates complex issues in an idiom familiar to the common man. Website: http://www.mkssindia.org | Email:

Nikhil Dey, one of the founder members of Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan, has been actively working for various campaigns such as Right to Information, Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, Lokpal Bill and Right to Food. He is also the Co-Convener of the National Campaign for People's Right to Information (NCPRI). Website: http://www.mkssindia.org | http://righttoinformation.info | Email:

R. Subrahmanyam is the Joint Secretary of Department of Rural Development in the Union Ministry. He is an IAS officer of the 1985 batch of Andhra Pradesh cadre.

Sowmya Kidambi is the Director of the Society for Social Audit, Accountability and Transparency, an organization set up by the Department of Rural Development, Government of Andhra Pradesh, to carry out independent Social Audits of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Schemes. She holds a master's degree in Social Work from the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, and a Diploma in Human Rights from Columbia University, New York. Website: http://socialaudit.ap.gov.in | Email:

T. R. Raghunandan is a former Joint Secretary, Ministry of Panchayati Raj, Government of India. He is currently a consultant for anti-corruption movements and an advocate of decentralized governance. Email:

Shahina Perween works with The Hunger Project, an organization that aims to sustain the leadership spirit in women elected to village panchayats. Among other things, she is involved in the design of the organization’s programmatic interventions in Bihar and the training of elected women representatives in the state. Website: http://thpindia.org | Email:

Shailesh Gandhi is a former Central Information Commissioner for the Right to Information Act. A graduate in Civil Engineering from IIT Bombay, he sold his business to become an RTI activist. He gave many landmark decisions on RTI and continues to advocate on various governance-related issues. Email:

Deeply disturbed with the injustice and corruption in the implementation of rural development programmes like the MGNREGA in his village in Bihar, Sanjay Sahni began searching for ways to fight for the rights of the poor. This led him to give up his job as an electrician in Delhi, go back to his village Ratnauli in Muzzafarpur in Bihar, and work to build Samaj Parivartan Shakti Sangathan, an organization of and for poor, landless villagers. His journey also led his colleagues and him to use the internet to access information, mobile platforms to communicate and spread the message, and video recordings and websites as a part of their documentation communication modes. Today, thousands of villagers are a part of Sahni's organization and continue their fight against injustice through collective mobilization. Website: http://spssbihar.org | Email:

Aruna Roy is a political and social activist. She started out as an IAS officer, but left the service to work among the people in rural Rajasthan. She is one of the founders of Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan. She has pioneered the Right to Information movement in India, which led to the enactment of the Act in 2005. The MKSS, in over 25 years of its existence, has taken up issues ranging from human rights and women's rights in Rajasthan to local jan sunwais or public hearings on social issues. Roy was bestowed with the Ramon Magsaysay Award for Community Leadership in the year 2000. Website: http://www.mkssindia.org | Email:

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